More Than Just a Sign in the Yard – The Expert Listing Agent

I recently worked with a seller who’d had his Cookeville home on the market for 244 days with an agent from another firm. He listed his home with me and it sold within two weeks. When I met with him to accept the sales contract he said, “I never knew how much could be done to sell a home until we listed with you. There’s a lot more to it than just a sign in the yard.” He was exactly right.

Unfortunately, many agents have been in the business a very long time and are stuck in the old way of doing things. They aren’t interested in learning about new technology or techniques being used to sell a home. They want to continue doing things the way it was done in 1980 instead of embracing all the marketing opportunities provided in the age of the Internet. Given that over 85% of home buyers start their search on the Internet, you can imagine why the old way of doing just won’t get a home sold anymore. To make matters worse, many agents new to the business learn “How to sell a home” from these same agents. Putting a sign in the yard and hoping is no longer a viable sales strategy.

Some examples of what I mean? Well, how many of you look through online listings and see blurry, dark pictures? This is easily fixed with a decent camera and a good working knowledge of Adobe Photoshop. This problem is an example of lack of time and money being spent by the listing agent. It takes several hours of work to do this correctly. You really need to take a ton of pictures when you list a house so you can choose from the very best ones. I probably take 200+ when I list a house. Then you have to spend time resizing those photos so they upload to the Internet correctly without being distorted. You have to know how to adjust brightness, contrast, color, ect. to make sure your photos show the house in the best light possible.

Another invaluable tool that so many agents skip? The virtual tour. Honestly, I can’t believe any home seller settles for not having one. I’ve heard every excuse in the book for agents not providing this for their clients. “It’s too expensive”. “I don’t use it that much.” “It takes too much time”. “The program never works right”. Again, we come down to time, knowledge, and expense. The reality is that a virtual tour functions as the very first showing on your property. If a buyer likes what they see there, then they are likely to request an appointment to see the house or property in person. Yes, it does take a good deal of time to shoot the photos correctly and put the tour together. That’s part of being an expert listing agent and taking pride in a job well done.

Next up: Websites. Can you believe that there are still agents in the business that don’t even have a website? It’s true, and I’ll never understand why anyone would list their home with one of those agents. This is a BIG red flag. If the agent doesn’t even have their own website, then they sure aren’t going to know anything about getting your property listing out on other websites. The majority of agents just have a very basic website that they outsource to a web company of some sort. They don’t know the first thing about websites but know they need one and trust that the company is doing a good job. Personal, I can’t settle for that. I have three websites that I personally maintain and control the content on. This allows me to fine tune the way I present listings and use my knowledge of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to drive traffic and promote my listings. In addition to my own website, I also syndicate or personally post my listings to another 50+ websites. People have to be able to find your property online if you hope to get it sold. The more websites the better!

Another tool I really love and don’t see anyone else using is a flyer/QR code combo. There are a very few agents who still put out flyer boxes and I do understand why. It’s expensive to print flyers and a pain to keep that box filled up. Kind of an out-dated way of doing things anyway. But, it’s only outdated if you don’t pair it up with the technology of the QR code. What the heck is a QR code and how does it help sell a house? A QR code is a small square of code that’s readable by a smartphone app…..you know, the smartphones that half the planet now uses? Imagine what happens when a buyer stops and picks up the flyer for your home, scans the code, and takes the virtual tour while sitting in your driveway. Think they might call for an appointment? I do.

I could go on for hours about what makes a great listing agent. However, my marketing plan is massive and I don’t want to share all my secrets with the world. 😉

Thinking of listing a property in Cookeville or the surrounding area? Do yourself a favor and interview me because you simply won’t find a listing agent who does more to market a property than I do.